Regional Challenge in the Healthcare Sector

Administrating the healthcare sectors in all EU member states is an expensive, complex and difficult process The inequalities in the healthcare sectors throughout Europe are a reason for concern. Due to the EU East expansion, there have been economic and structural changes in the healthcare sectors in the border regions of Austria, Hungary-Slovakia-Czech Republic (A-HU-SK-CZ), which have an effect on the provision of care, the labour market and the development of tourism. This in turn affects providers, consumers and employees ( intra-/extra mural sectors, wellness sector etc) in the healthcare service sector. With these changes, there are new challenges and chances for the healthcare sector in the border regions which would need to be investigated by politicians and decision-makers alike. It is crucial that such developments are acknowledged and consequently actively shaped.

Critical Changes in the Healthcare Sector

The current situation of the provision of medical care in the region is marked by a clear city/province decline, price and service differences as well as a shifting ”health tourism“ (e.g. dental treatment or wellness complexes) whereby there are no regulations for the cross border treatment of emergency cases or compensation for cross border treatment at healthcare resorts or rehabilitation periods. In addition, the classical borders between medicine and ”well-being“ provision are beginning to break up and the current development in the healthcare sector is moving more from medical repair and rehabilitation to care and preventative medicine.
Medical amenities, from surgeries to the running of health resorts must orient themselves more towards the needs of the clients to be able to stay marketable: service character and targeted marketing measures are a must to be able to exist as ”healthcare service providers“.
Health tourism is currently one of the strongest growth segments in the whole tourist sector and plays a great role in the border areas between Austria, Hungary, the Czech Republic and Slovakia with its extensive offers of healthcare provision, joint surgeries and health resorts and thermal facilities. Health culture has a long tradition in this region and is an historically grown economic factor.

Competitiveness and Securing Quality

Due to these changes, Vienna, Lower Austria, Burgenland and the border regions of HU-SK-CZ have been given a unique chance of attaining a new position as economic and quality locations for healthcare services: it is critical to recognize the specific requirements and the ways in which these can be accomplished together. Therefore, it is also necessary to build concrete strategies and concepts for a sustainable development of this region, as well as all the related legal and cost relevant changes. It is important to deal cooperatively for the implementation of measures, the utilisation of synergies and the well-timed networking of all responsible political and economic stakeholders This sustains and strengthens the competitiveness of healthcare services provision in this region and, in the future, will secure jobs and open new employment possibilities on a global level. Co-operation and networking serve not least to secure quality standards concerning the participating establishments and can contribute to making the central European region a quality location for healthcare services in the whole of Europe.

Political Responsibility

The concern of the European Community for the improvement of the population’s healthcare can only be guaranteed through collective concepts for the optimisation of healthcare provision. Strategies for the reduction of inequalities in the healthcare sector in the community and the mitigation of their consequences require co-ordinated measures in the central political sector. This can serve to secure the access to services in the healthcare sector, which, in turn, will secure the quality of the provision of healthcare services and positively influence the economic development of the healthcare sector. Therefore, political influence can make a crucial contribution in the support of the central European region on its way to being a quality location for healthcare services in Europe.